Last Day of Class

Ok, people, sappy alert! If you hate that kind of stuff, click away now, because I'm a girl who needs to process some stuff.

Everyday view on campus

My last log-in at the library on campus

I just went back and re-read my first post, back in January when this semester had barely begun. Even then I felt the nostalgia pressing on the edges of my thoughts, the calendar already running faster toward graduation than I wanted it to.

This whole semester has felt like the final chapter of a great book. You don't want the book to end, but the more invested you are in the story, the faster the pages turn under your thumb. Suddenly you realize that the characters you've grown to love are only two or three sheets of pressed tree pulp from being put back on the shelf.

I know that the sequel will be good, but seriously...why is change so hard?

Sitting in my last class, 4/26/12

Yesterday was THE LAST day of class for my entire undergraduate career.

My teachers were so cute. They all tried, in various ways, to delay the end of class, to put off the coming closure. I will sincerely miss their lectures.  My profs have all been great, but I had some real gems this spring. (Click here for some hilarious proof.)

I wish I could say I savored yesterday fully, soaked up buckets of fun memories and felt only joy and relief, but the main thing I felt was

profound...

exhaustion. 

I used to scoff, but now I'm a believer: senioritis is a real, honest-to-goodness disease, and sister, I've got it BAD. My eyes are sagging with lack of sleep, and my motivation is sagging even worse. I told Hubby that I wanted to hibernate like a bear  and then wake up in two weeks to get my diploma. He laughed at me, but I know he understood.

But then, after an exhausting last day, we went to the last homegroup meeting. :)

Fifteen of us sat, knees and elbows crammed into the small space filled with friends. As the room swelled with the sound of our worship, my shoulders untwisted and my heart calmed. Jesus was there, in the room with us, and nothing else--not my tiredness or the papers I had to write, or my million other worries--were as important as Him.

We drank purple juice and ate pinches of bread from a chewy loaf as we remembered His deep love. The love that never runs out, never gets tired.

We each shared the things God has been teaching us this semester, and to hear the recitation was to worship all over again!  It was beautiful to see and hear what He is doing in all of us: teaching us patience, getting us out of addictive behavior, bringing us out of depression or control-freak tendencies or co-dependent relationships.

Then--the best moment! Almost-graduates, like me, sat in the middle while the rest crowded around and hugged us as they thanked God for us and prayed for us. Under my arm, I could feel Kerri's shoulders move with silent tears.

I could cry happy tears now for the ways that God has been so faithful!

But now I really REALLY need to sleep.  G'night and gig'em!